Designed to mark the centenary of the birth of Callas, a museum in her honor, presented as the first of its kind in the world, is inaugurated Thursday in the Greek capital.
After 25 years of preparations, Athens inaugurates on Thursday October 26 a museum in honor of the legendary soprano Maria Callas, presented as the first of its kind in the world. Designed to mark the centenary of the diva’s birth, the museum displays more than 1,300 items, including a Callas school album, books and scores, opera dresses and photographs, organizers said. “The great diva Maria Callas returns home“, enthused the mayor of the Greek capital, Kostas Bakoyannis.
“It’s a museum for all the senses”
“We are very proud of this first museum which combines technology and lived experience“, he added. The museum, located in the heart of the Greek capital, is a four-storey listed building dating from the 1920s which previously housed a hotel. Its construction took more than ten years and cost 1.5 million euros.”It’s a museum for all the senses” promised Konstantinos Dedes, one of the project supervisors. The tour begins on the second floor, where visitors enter a forest scene while Callas – a silhouette on the back wall – sings an aria from the opera Norma by Bellini.
:quality(50)/2023/10/26/000-33z76jn-653a2de624d9d507494874.jpg)
Another room recreates the nighttime view from the diva’s balcony in Paris, with its billowing curtains. Also included is a recording of Maria Callas giving a talk at the Juilliard School of Music in New York in the early 1970s.”You don’t need to overplay“, she said sternly to the students. “Just use your face and eyes. You must not sing. You need to eliminate the sound“, she also says.
:quality(50)/2023/10/26/000-33z76je-653a2df60a88b564829049.jpg)
Among the centerpieces of the collection are the artist’s personal photo album, a mirror placed in her dressing room and her prescription glasses, which she almost never wore. There are also matchbooks donated by airlines and hotels during his last world tour in 1973-1974, as well as the menu of the famous evening organized in Venice in 1957, during which Callas met the Greek magnate Aristotle Onassis. She eventually divorced her husband, Italian industrialist Giovanni Meneghini, to marry Onassis, who then left her for former US First Lady Jackie Kennedy.
“Attract those who don’t know”
Dozens of Greek institutions and private collectors, including artists Alekos Fassianos, Dimitris Mytaras and Panagiotis Tetsis, have contributed to the new museum, the city said. Some objects were donated by La Scala in Milan, the Metropolitan Opera, La Fenice in Venice and the Arena di Verona, where Callas made his Italian debut in 1947.”We wanted to attract those who do not know (Callas) and do not listen to opera (…) and help them understand what distinguished her” from other artists, explained Erato Koutsoudaki, designer of the museum exhibition.
Born in New York to Greek immigrant parents in 1923, Sophia Cecilia Anna Maria Kalogeropoulou lived in Athens from 1937 to 1945, after her parents separated. “As soon as my mother realized my vocal qualities, she decided to make me a child prodigy“, Callas later wrote. “But child prodigies never had a real childhood“.
The building in Athens where Callas briefly lived with his mother and sister will become a music academy, Kostas Bakoyannis said on Wednesday (October 25). After taking singing lessons at the National Conservatory, she made her professional debut at the Royal Opera of Athens in 1941. What followed was a rich career spanning more than thirty years.
Maria Callas died in Paris in 1977, at the age of 53. His ashes were scattered in the Aegean Sea two years later. A film about the life of the famous soprano starring Angelina Jolie is due to be released next year.